Deciding to homeschool is a big decision. It’s an exciting, scary, and frustrating time! Don’t fear, I am going to discuss in this article where to start and some helpful information.
Why Homeschool?
This can be a touchy topic! Here’s a list of things: family time, values, Covid, educational quality, medical reasons, mental health! I do not want to turn this into a political post for obvious reasons! Family time, with homeschooling you are spending soo many quality hours together. You are watching your child grow and learn, and seeing their accomplishments and hugging them through their failures!
Maybe you are deeply religious or have certain core values you wanna instill in your child and now you can! Covid has resulted in more families to homeschool than ever before! Some parents are for the vaccination, some against. Masks, some are for it some against. Staffing issues for busses and teachers and lunch room staff. It seems no matter what your stance, most parents feel strongly one way or another.
Now, I really don’t mean to come off like I am bashing public school, but it just does not compare to schooling at home. I don’t care how good a teacher is, it is literally impossible to pay as much attention to your child as you do. They on average have 30 students per class to contend with! They are dealing with little Johnny’s outbursts and the class clown. They are making sure everyone is turned to page 231 in Social Studies. This may WASTE 15 minutes of class time! You are probably spending 1 to 2 minutes getting your child settled!
Your child might breeze through Math and they are just horrible with English. (That was me!) So you know what you breeze through Math class and keep progressing at a fast speed keeping their interest. Now English class you take your time even if that means falling behind a little. You make sure your child understands and knows the material before adding more! Public school cannot cater to your kids in this way, cause honestly, it is just not fair to the rest of the class!
Lastly, some kids literally cry every morning before school. They might be getting bullied, they might not be good at math or spelling and get made fun of. They might not have the newest sneakers and they feel ashamed. They might not like their teacher. They could have ADHD or ASD or other medical conditions that make a classroom environment very difficult for them. With schooling at home you can cater to their needs!
Types of Homeschooling
There are 3 main types of schooling at home and it really branches out from there. De-school, Unschool, and Homeschool. Any type of homeschooling is going to be worlds apart from public school. For de-school, some parents believe that it’s best to give their kids a break before starting at home. (Some people say de-school isn’t a form of homeschool, cause your literally not doing school at all!) They want not only themselves but their children to get out of public school thinking. Homeschool isn’t a 7 am to 3 pm type of school. It isn’t raising your hand asking if you can use the bathroom. Homeschool is freedom! For the parents that do de-school the recommendation is to take off one month of school for every year the child has been in public school. So for a Senior in high school, we are talking a year! This is personally not a method I would choose, but the parents that do it rave about the benefits!
Now there is unschool. Unschool can be so varied from house to house. The real meaning of unschool is child-led learning and potentially using unconventional methods to get this accomplished. I could literally write a 25-minute read article on the subject, there’s so many variations of this.
But here are the broad strokes. The general consensus, in most of the homeschool groups I am a part of is that the parents want a stress-free homeschool. For the young ones K-2nd: They want their children to develop at what they consider an age-appropriate level. Most do not feel it is appropriate to sit a kid at a desk and teach them. They feel kids should learn through play, math should be learned by cooking or playing games. Science should be taught by taking a hike. Social Studies/Geography can be taught during car rides. We are headed south on Main Street, We are in the town of Portland, and the next town over is such and such. For older kids, if the child is very interested in foreign countries, they will have that child maybe spend a month or so at a time watching videos and documentaries maybe reading books.
They feel the benefits of following your child’s interests far out-weigh following public school guidelines. I will be creating a ton of content on this subject in the future!
Homeschool, well again there are a dozen different types of homeschool, but again I will be going over the broad strokes. For the most part, homeschooling is simply teaching your child at home. It’s having the freedom to do school in your pajamas, or on your outdoor patio, or in their bed. It’s still learning in a more traditional way but with freedom.
Some parents like myself use online school, others buy curriculums and some make their own curriculum. The largest difference between public school and homeschooling is time!!! Public school, waking up at 6 am getting ready, waiting on the bus, long bus ride, taking attendance, switching from class to class, lunch breaks, recess breaks, bus ride home. That is a ton of wasted time. My first grader is done with school before your child is probably starting first period!
First graders, they will probably spend 30 minutes to an hour daily in school at home. The amount they can learn in 15 minutes time without distractions is amazing. Plus it is one on one private tutor! Even highschool kids can get their studies done in roughly 3 hours. It’s letting them get a good night’s sleep and doing school at a convenient time for the family.
Now your child has all this extra time for play, for starting a hobby, for learning life skills. It’s a beautiful and amazing thing to watch! I will delve further into this topic on future blogs.
Where to start?
First, you need to research state laws. I highly recommend HSLDA. Second, you need to discover what you want your homeschool to look like! Are you against screen-time? Are you looking for something that is budget friendly? Do you wanna use a curriculum or just wing it? Do you want to start at 7 am everyday or are you thinking of doing it when convenient? Do you want your kid to sit at a desk, or do you want hands on learning? (learning math by baking or construction!) These are the questions you need to ask yourself!
Then, do more research! There are multiple times of homeschool, I briefly discussed 3 above. So De-school, Unschool, School at home, Classical education, Charlotte Mason, University Model, Unit Studies, and Eclectic! For length purposes, I will create a blog for each type of homeschool.
How to Start:
So hopefully you have checked out your state laws at HSLDA! I would say more than a handful of states require at least some sort of notice! In my state of NY, we have to send in a letter of intent. Its simply a sentence or 2 stating that we intend to homeschool our children with names, ages, and grades of your children. You should at this point be ready to begin homeschooling! I know its scary but you can do this! Join FB groups, get involved in local homeschool groups. Be excited to start this journey with your family.
Conclusion
Whatever your reason to homeschool, know its a good one! Learn about the different types of homeschool and what you would really like yours to look like. Remember homeschool is freedom! Personally, I mix schooling at home with unschool and its an amazing fit for my family! You do not have to pick one category and stick with it. You can mix and match. You can start by doing eclectic and realize thats not a good fit and change your method! Check out laws for your state. Order your curriculum or program or create your own and get started!
